Besmirching Ourselves Online: A Q&A With the Author of The Future of Reputation - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog#more-2552
An interesting article and book. One point that the author didn't bring up in the interview but may address in the book is what this is going to do to politics. Whereas at one time someone might turn up an embarrassing photo of a politician from their past, now anyone who is interested in the public arena will likely have a very public life before even running for office.
I think that the current debate over Reverend Wright and Barrack Obama is a symptom of this. If every politician had to answer for every single e-mail and/or blog post or online forum post they might have made elections are going to be nearly impossible. At some point the electorate is going to say enough is enough, we don't care what he said when he was 18 in college, we want to know what she will do now.
THis is not neccesarily a bad thing. Knowing that they will be held to account for all the poison they have spewed over the years will surely keep people like Michelle Malkin and Rush Limbaugh from ever seeking office.
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